The cover of The Economist for the first week of November 1997 is one of my all time favorites. Here it is, and a quick note to the good folks at the magazine: I am not making a dime from this, but thanks: If you are reading this on your phone, you might have a hard time reading the captions. On the far left, a broker is telling a client over the phone “I’ve got a...

The stock market has been acting crazy recently, mostly in a bad way. Should investors be worried, and why? When the S&P 500 fell apart from 2000 to 2002, in hindsight it was easy to see what had happened: due to Y2K and some easy money, investors put unrealistic growth assumptions on so-called “new economy” stocks. When everything went south in 2008, we knew it was because of problem loans and debt securities made out...

This week, Fed Chairman Janet Yellen gave the investing world a meaty headline when she opined that stocks are overvalued, generally speaking that is. Almost immediately, tongue wagging pundits started comparing her comments to Alan Greenspan’s famous “irrational exuberance” quote. Remember that one? Well, here it is, in case you don’t: “Clearly, sustained low inflation implies less uncertainty about the future, and lower risk premiums imply higher prices of stocks and other earning assets. We...